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Durham Region launches Open Data pilot

In accordance with the Government of Ontario's 2015 Open Data Directive, The Regional Municipality of Durham's Corporate Services-Information Technology Division has launched a new Open Data pilot initiative, which will allow the public to freely access select data online atwww.durham.ca.

Open Data is a philosophy and practice that requires certain data to be made freely available to the public, in machine-readable format, without any restrictions from copyright, patents or other mechanisms of control. The Region of Durham recognizes the importance of making data freely available to the public, and this pilot initiative is the first step towards achieving this.

The initial data sets released to the public as part of the pilot focus on readily available geographic information system (GIS) data, which includes Single Line Road Network (SLRN) data, Durham-wide address points, transit routes, transit stop locations and General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) data.

"As select data sets are made available, the pilot project will measure the quality from a public perspective, and determine which content has the greatest value to the public, based on download metrics," said Matthew Gaskell, Commissioner of Corporate Services. "By removing restrictions to this data, local industry and research organizations can make even larger contributions to local economic development and innovation."

Upon completion of the pilot in December, the usage of all data that was made available will be gathered and analyzed to evaluate the cost, benefits and impact of freely sharing other data sets to the public in the future. Recommendations will then be made on the further adoption of Open Data at the Region of Durham.

For more information on the Open Data pilot initiative, and for access to the available data sets, visitwww.durham.ca/opendata.